Lacrosse-Trempealeau County WI Archives Biographies.....Smith, James Irwin March 31, 1827 - 
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Author: Unknown

REV. JAMES IRWIN SMITH, son of a farmer, merchant and mill-owner, located on 
the Cool Spring, in Mercer Co., in Pennsylvania; was born the 31st of March, 
1827; the descendant of Presbyterian parentage, and as the church where they 
worshipped was built upon his father's farm, it is not strange that he early 
loved its doctrines and its ordinances; his education was begun in his home 
and carried forward in the country schools, which he attended in winters; at 
the age of 15, he determined to procure a liberal education wholly by his own 
efforts, and, Dec. 12, 1842, entered Mercer Academy, then managed by an 
enthusiastic educator, Samuel Griffiths, Esq.; his first term as a teacher was 
five months in West Greenville, Penn., during the winter of 1844-45, after 
which, he returned again to the academy. In the fall of 1845, he left the 
academy and went to the South, at that period the inviting field for teachers; 
there he spent three years and a half in Tennessee, the first in a school 
organized in Williamson Co.; the second as tutor in Jackson College, Columbia; 
the last year and a half at the head of Central Academy, in Rutherford Co.; in 
these engagements, he was successful, acquiring ample means for the completing 
of his course of education, and a balance for the purchase of a home after it 
was finished. Returning to Pennsylvania, he entered Jefferson College, and, in 
1851, graduated with honors in a class of 54; he passed directly to the 
Western Theological Seminary at Allegheny, Penn., and was licensed to preach 
by the Erie Prebytery Sept. 8, 1853, and ordained by the same Presbytery in 
August, 1854. Losing health by prolonged studies and teaching, and through an 
attack of typhoid fever during college course, he went in the spring of 1852, 
to recuperate on the wild, health-reviving shores of Lake Superior; the region 
was but sparsely settled then at any point, but the mines of copper were being 
pushed with great vigor; busied with studies and with health-giving 
occupations, he resisted all solicitations to embark in the speculative 
enterprises so rife at that date, and resolved still on his original purpose 
of preaching the Gospel so soon as health should be re-established; with this 
view, however, he accepted an appointment as clerk of the Copper Falls and 
Summit Mines at a liberal salary, determined to maintain himself by the 
salary, and to preach to the surrounding villages and mines on the Sabbath, as 
he had ascertained, in a snow-shoe tour of exploration round the lake, there 
was at the time only a single ordained Protestant minister engaged among the 
whites for the whole region; his project he laid before the Rev. W. H. 
Hazleton, a Baptist clergyman from New Hampshire, like himself in quest of 
health. "No!" said this friend. "If you will preach, I will find the money for 
your support." Thus they were to set out upon the planting of churches 
together; the position was resigned with its income; and when returning to the 
lake after licensure, Mr. Smith found fields of far greater promise higher up 
the shore of the lake in the Ontonagan district, the arrangement for co-
operative labors between the Baptist and Presbyterian were not carried out in 
that form; located at Ontonagon, the entrepot for the largest production and 
imports on Lake Superior at the time, a house of worship was built in 1854, 
mainly by means collected by Mr. Smith, and a church organized in that town; 
from the first, his labors were extended to all the settlements in the 
interior; his habit was to walk long distances and preach thrice on each 
Sabbath; in due time churches were constituted in his charge at Maple Grove 
and at Rockland, and his habit for years was to ride twenty-five miles every 
Sabbath and deliver three sermons to his people. This charge, he resigned in 
June, 1865, to accept the appointment of his Synod of St. Paul to traverse the 
territory of the Synod, and gather and organize churches, and procure for them 
ministers; passing the summer at this work, the heat and journeys proved 
excessive in absence of all railway facilities then, and he relinquished the 
work, preaching for the winter in the Andrew Church, St. Anthony; in this 
capacity, however, he visited La Crosse, Wis., embraced in the territory of 
that Synod; deciding that this city had claims upon the Presbyterians, and 
prospects to warrant the founding of a church, he removed hither with his 
family from St. Paul, arriving May 2, 1866; he at once began labors amongst a 
people entirely unknown to him and to each other as Presbyterians; and in 
August of that year, organized the first church of this city, of which he 
remained Pastor till June, 1880; from its membership was constituted also the 
church of North La Crosse, called the North Church of La Crosse since the 
consolidation of that village with the city; of this, he retained the charge 
jointly with the first church till September, 1876. In April, 1881, he removed 
to Galesville, to have charge of the Presbyterian Church, and a share in the 
management of the University at that place.

Additional Comments:
From History of La Crosse County, Wisconsin, 1881, p. 795 - 796.

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